Georgetown University is perhaps an unofficial rival of The Catholic University of America. Of course, we were always keen upon hearing of a stray Hoya to ask them rather pointedly, “Why didn’t you go to a real Catholic university?” before laughing it off.
Back when I was a lowly freshman at CUA, our crucifixes were thankfully going back up after many years of absence, while at Georgetown they were reportedly all coming down in the name of diversity and for fear of offending a soul.
Of course, that’s what the cross is supposed to be — offensive, a crux. Christ crucified; a stumbling block (1 Cor. 1:23). That’s the whole point.
Apparently, some stumbling blocks are more equal than others at Georgetown University, as Catholicism takes a back seat to the new, more fashionable faith of the postmodern era — social justice.
Catholic News Agency reported last week that a pro-marriage Catholic student group on campus called Love Saxa is being hauled before a tribunal for the shocking and appalling crime of upholding Catholic values at the flagship Jesuit university.
Their faithcrime? Well…no one really knows as of yet. Which isn’t quite true, because we already know what their faithcrime was. Simply put, they practiced their Catholic faith on a Catholic campus. At Georgetown. Where Jesuits exist. In numbers.
Other Georgetown student organizations have rallied to the defense of Love Saxa, including the conservative publication The Georgetown Review and the Georgetown chapter of the Knights of Columbus.
Hunter Estes, the president of the Georgetown Knights of Columbus, stated very plainly the reality on the ground: “I fear the day, which is actively coming into fruition, where I am unable to practice my Catholic faith on a Catholic campus, without being called hateful, because my opinion defies the orthodoxy of the student body.”
Now obviously there is a simple retort from the sort of administrators who love to do finger pushups. Georgetown is a university, and like all universities they must encourage an environment of free inquiry and free speech because after all, the Deposit of Truth and Faith has nothing to fear from error and doubt…and in order to foster an environment of learning, we have to abandon outmoded rigidities in favor of being open to wherever the Holy Spirit chooses to lead.
Thanks for your time, don’t forget to take a wills and bequests pamphlet with you. Next customer, please?
Once upon a time, the Jesuits enjoyed the reputation of being known as God’s Marines. Open-minded and imbued with the Ignatian spirit, there was a rubric and a confidence that came with knowing that God, SJ, leaned just a little on the side of the Men in Black.
For one reason or another, this reputation has slipped even after Pope St. John Paul II issued Ex Corde Ecclesiae specifically for the purposes of ensuring that Catholic colleges and universities (particularly in the United States) performed the radical and unexpected task of actually producing educated Catholic men and women from her own institutions.
Instead, we have Catholic colleges and universities who are Catholic in name only. The Cardinal Newman Society continues to bear witness to fresh outrages almost daily, and yet nothing is done. Alumni are told things will change, and every year things get a little bit worse. Georgetown itself proclaims loudly and proudly the month of OUTober, though one suspects that if Pope Francis were coming to town during that month, a different tune might be sung.
Every pew-sitting Catholic knows that bureaucrats willing to negotiate and bargain with our faith have taken over the institutions. Some Catholic organizations dole out contraceptives and no one blinks. Catholic colleges and universities produce nothing different than what you’d find at any ordinary school, and no one cares. Formerly Catholic hospitals make referrals for abortions, and the administration shrugs.
Little Sisters of the Poor were forced to pay for contraceptives they didn’t need, and Catholics tilt their head five degrees before turning the next page.
Catholics are told to give to defend life and family, while lobbyists punt on the babies and play the access game.
Personnel is policy, or so the old saying goes. A fog of bureaucracy interposes itself between the laity and our bishops, and that fog is thick indeed. Jobs and salaries — not souls — are at stake for many of these individuals, all jeopardized if we adhered to what we actually believe as Catholics.
Whatever is going on at Georgetown University, one really has to feel genuine sorrow for the students who expected a Jesuit education and are receiving instead a tyranny of the undereducated mob whose feelings and federally subsidized tuitions triumph over the purpose of the institution itself. They aren’t alone.
Perhaps there is hope. Some bishops have certainly done their best to restore the identity of Catholic University, and change can happen over a generation or even a few years. After all, the only thing worse than a cafeteria Catholicism is a counterfeit Catholicism: a cross-less Christ or a Christ-less cross.
Stumble as you will.

+ + +

Fr. M writes to me regarding an article he penned back in 2012 about what happens when our true “First Teachers” are absent. What follows is a story about African elephants who, in order to thin out the herd, are transported to another wildlife preserve — only it’s just the mothers and children, not the larger male bull elephants too heavy for transport.
You can only imagine what ensues. Elephants being surprisingly social animals, the younger male elephants begin behaving badly — and not in a humorous way. Rhinos are found mutilated and torn, their horns left intact and indicating that the work was not that of poachers. Sure enough, without the presence of fathers, the pachyderms simply didn’t have a hierarchy to teach the younger generation.
Demographers will tell you that the best promise for the success of a child is dependent entirely on three key indicators: 1) being raised by your biological parents inside a single household, 2) obtaining a high school education, and 3) getting married and not divorcing. Perform these three simple life choices? You will not subsist in poverty.
Break any part of this chain and your children will unfortunately have to pick up the slack. In today’s world with its multitude of distractions and lack of social institutions, that is no easy task. Young men find it far easier to remain permanent adolescents; rhinos taking the forms of MMA, video games, sports or anything (or anyone) else deemed consequence free.
Less wildlife. More preserve.

+ + +

Of course, I am succeeding (but not replacing) the inestimable Mr. James K. Fitzpatrick for the First Teachers column. Please feel free to send any correspondence for First Teachers to Shaun Kenney, c/o First Teachers, 5289 Venable Road, Kents Store, VA 23084 — or if it is easier, simply send me an e-mail with First Teachers in the subject line to: svk2cr@virginia.edu.

Vatican City, Feb 17, 2018 / 05:10 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Saturday the Vatican announced that Pope Francis has reconfirmed Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston as head of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, also reconfirming seven members…Continue Reading

WASHINGTON, D.C. – In response to the Trump administration’s 2019 federal budget proposal on Monday, the U.S. Catholic bishops are urging for a budget that shows greater concern for “‘the least of these” and warning that the U.S. “must never seek…Continue Reading

A Connecticut high school student may have to decide whether to remove a Planned Parenthood sticker on her laptop or leave her Catholic school after administrators told her to remove it, her parents said. Sophomore Kate Murray’s parents told the Greenwich Time that…Continue Reading

February 8, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – The Bible’s condemnation of homosexual acts should be taken in “context” with Biblical times, Jesuit Father James Martin toldGeorgetown University students recently. Martin said as well that Catholics who support gay “marriage” should have no problem…Continue Reading

JACKSON, Mississippi, February 2, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – A bill banning abortion on babies more than 15 weeks old passed the Mississippi state House today 79-31. House Bill 1510 would make Mississippi the state with the most pro-life laws if it…Continue Reading

Just three Democrats in the U.S. Senate supported a bill on Monday that would prohibit abortions after 20 weeks when unborn babies are capable of feeling pain. The Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, which has strong public support from Republicans…Continue Reading

ROME, January 30, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – In an exclusive interview two weeks after issuing a profession of immutable truths about sacramental marriage, Bishop Athanasius Schneider is inviting his brother bishops around the world to join in raising a common voice…Continue Reading

As Katholisch.de, the official website of the German bishops, reports today, Cardinal Willem Eijk, the Dutch cardinal and Metropolitan Archbishop of Utrecht, requested that Pope Francis bring light into the confusion concerning the question as to how to deal with…Continue Reading

When Selena Miller, a practicing Catholic, applied to DePaul, she had no idea it was a Catholic university. Damita Meneves, another practicing Catholic, said she has met only one other Catholic student in her first year at DePaul. DePaul is…Continue Reading

His Eminence, Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke, spoke recently with Thinking with the Church, hosted by Chris Altieri, who is also a regular contributor to Catholic World Report. Cardinal Burke responds to questions regarding the interpretation and reception of the post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation, Amoris…Continue Reading

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By DON FIER (Editor’s Note: His Eminence Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke, Patron of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta and Founder of the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in La Crosse, Wis., graciously took time out of his busy schedule to grant The Wanderer a wide-ranging interview during a recent visit to the Shrine. Included among the topics…Continue Reading

By RAYMOND LEO CARDINAL BURKE (Editor’s Note: His Eminence Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke delivered the address below at the 32nd Annual Church Teaches Forum, “The Message of Fatima: Peace for the World,” Galt House, Louisville, Ky., July 22, 2017. The address is reprinted here with the kind permission of Cardinal Burke. All rights reserved. This is part one of the…Continue Reading

Catechism

Today . . .

There’s nothing, it seems, that the abortion chain Planned Parenthood won’t sue over. On Thursday, affiliates of the abortion chain in seven states sued the Trump administration for cutting funding for their questionable teen pregnancy prevention programs. The Daily Nonpareil reports the lawsuits argue that the Trump administration wrongly cut their funding prematurely and without cause. Nine groups, including Planned Parenthood affiliates in Washington, Iowa, North Carolina, South C

CAMBRIDGE, England, February 15, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – A respected Catholic historian and philosopher challenged Cardinal Blase Cupich during a lecture last week about Pope’ Francis so-called “revolution of mercy” that has caused what many are defending as a “paradigm shift” in Catholic practice. Professor John Rist, after listening to a February 9 lecture at Cambridge Universityin which Cardinal Cupich praised Pope Francis’ “paradigm shift” in Catholic practice, asked the Cardinal at the end of the lect

VIENNA, Austria, February 14, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – Austria’s bishops, led by Vienna’s Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, are indignant over a retired bishop’s passionate defense of Catholic teaching in opposing Church “blessings” for homosexual unions. After Bishop Andreas Laun, the retired Auxiliary Bishop of Salzburg, Austria, published Monday his strong rebuke of the German bishops for proposing to bless homosexual couples, there has been an inten

Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago is all for clarity. It has been a consistent theme, as when in September of 2017 he issued a decree banning guns in all parishes, schools and other facilities across the archdiocese “so there would be absolute clarity on our position.” His official statement put “clarity” in italics. When he was bishop of Rapid City, he called for “civility and clarity” in discussing legislation that would limit abortion, but he…Continue Reading

BEIJING — A group of influential Catholics published an open letter Monday express their shock and disappointment at report that the Vatican could soon reach a deal with the Chinese government, warning that it could create a schism in the church in China. The Holy See has been in negotiations for several years with the Chinese Communist Party and is now belie

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WASHINGTON, D.C. — Within a week of taking office on January 23, 2017, President Trump reinstated and expanded the Mexico City Policy, now called the Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance, which bans U.S. funding for abortions overseas. The expanded policy prohibits $9 billion in U.S. taxpayer money from funding foreign organizations that perform or…Continue Reading

By HANNAH BROCKHAUS VATICAN CITY (CNA/EWTN News) — The Congregation for the Causes of Saints has approved the second miracle needed for the canonization of Blessed Pope Paul VI, allowing his canonization to take place, possibly later this year. According to Vatican Insider, the Congregation for the Causes of Saints approved the miracle by a…Continue Reading

By STEPHEN M. KRASON (Editor’s Note: Stephen M. Krason’s Neither Left nor Right, but Catholic column appears monthly [sometimes bimonthly] in Crisis. He is professor of political science and legal studies and associate director of the Veritas Center for Ethics in Public Life at Franciscan University of Steubenville. He is also cofounder and president of…Continue Reading

By LISA BOURNE (Editor’s Note: LifeSiteNews ran this story on February 5.) + + + A Catholic priest is calling on bishops to excommunicate the 14 Catholic-identifying U.S. senators who voted two weeks ago against banning late-term abortions. He is also calling on priests to deny the Catholic pro-abortion senators Holy Communion. “Today is the…Continue Reading

By JAMES LIKOUDIS The centuries-old theological debate concerning the existence of Limbo for unbaptized babies (the limbo puerorum as a state of natural happiness) led to the 2007 publication of the document The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die Without Being Baptized by the International Theological Commission (ITC). The commission concluded there are “serious…Continue Reading

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Our Catholic Faith (Section B of print edition)

By DON FIER For a variety of reasons (a defect of consent, a diriment impediment, or a defect of the required form), many supposed modern-day marriages entered into by Catholic persons are invalid from their origin in the eyes of God and the Church. However, as we saw last week, depending on the circumstances, the Church has procedures by which…Continue Reading

Q. Concerning what our Blessed Mother said in Fatima about the rosary, I am confused as to whether or not she meant us to meditate on the mysteries while we are praying the Hail Marys or whether she meant us to meditate on the mysteries right before we say the Hail Marys. The consensus seems to be that we are…Continue Reading

By FR. ROBERT ALTIER Second Sunday Of Lent Readings: Gen. 22:1-2, 9a, 10-13, 15-18 Romans 8:31b-34 Mark 9:2-10 In the first reading today we hear about Abraham’s nearly incomprehensible act of faith and love for God shown in his willingness to sacrifice his own son. We have to be careful not to read this in a vacuum. This test, which…Continue Reading

By ANDREA GAGLIARDUCCI (Wanderer Editor’s Note: Catholic News Agency on February 3 published a commentary concerning a 1989 Vatican response to dissent against Humanae Vitae. Below is an excerpted version of that commentary. Following that, we reprint the full text of the 1989 Vatican response, which, as the CNA commentary explains, is now available on the Vatican’s website. Please also…Continue Reading

By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK A joke sometimes recounted among clergy goes along these lines: Someone greets a wise old priest by asking, “What’s new?”, and he responds, sagely, “Christ is risen!” The humor here is less about what’s new than about the fact that everything, other than the only true revolution of Christ’s Incarnation and triumph over death, is…Continue Reading

By CAROLE BRESLIN Great sinners make great saints. It takes a strong-willed child to become a saint. These are statements which would easily fit saints such as Mary Magdalene and St. Augustine. In the thirteenth century, a young lady free in spirit and strong in will led such a life that she was essentially driven from her home village, but…Continue Reading

By CAROLE BRESLIN In the lives of the saints one thing is very common: They have such a strong desire to do God’s will that nothing will hinder their work. Many saints, despite illness, weak health, or many other obstacles achieved their goals. Frequently the amount of work accomplished by such individuals seems humanly impossible — and, of course, it…Continue Reading